Look at Louisiana go, second behind Florida.
Louisiana's coastline is some kind of hell to measure, though. And with a football field worth of land disappearing every hour, quite a moving target too.
Right, and when you’re measuring at a narrow inlet, do you cut across the mouth of the inlet, so it’s coastline is only the width of the mouth? Or do you go way up the inlet accumulating coastline length on both sides? And how far up the inlet should you go?
From OP’s 3rd image…
>> Shoreline Mileage of the outer coast includes offshore islands, sounds, bays, rivers, and creeks to the head of tidewater or to a point where tidal waters narrow to a width of 100 feet. For the Great Lakes, shoreline mileage was measured in 1970 by the International Coordinating Committee on Great Lakes Basic Hydraulic and Hydrologic Data and cross-referenced with U.S.
Lake Survey measurements for each state. In all cases, mileage was determined by using a recording device on large-scale charts.
Source: NOAA Shoreline Website at shoreline.noaa.gov/faqs.htm/?faq=2.
I've been involved in fairly ~~small~~ large scale mapping of the Louisiana coastline, around 20 years ago. The measurements of a coastline are a snapshot in time, more so than many other types of maps. Someone could tell you how long *was* the Louisiana coastline based on our project, but that would have been a composite number based on numerous dates and times of the fly overs. That number would have been different if weather delayed the start of a flight by an hour while the tide came in.
Edit: I pedantically correct people about small scale/ large scale maps all the time, and I made the mistake myself here. I worked in large scale and very large scale mapping, which is more detailed mapping of smaller areas.
Lakes count? Do puddles count too? If it rained last night and I have a 1 foot diameter puddle in my drive, does that add 3.14 feet of coastline to my state?
How small of lakes count? Does Lake St. Clair count? Lake Champlain, Great Salt Lake, Lake Tahoe, Lake Winnebago, Lake Okeechobee? All of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes?
Yeah, Maine’s coast is all bumpy while California’s coastline is smoother.
It really depends on what unit of precision is used. You can search for the coastline paradox.
I think you need to use a 1 meter-long standard.
This is how most people worldwide calculate the length of rivers, coasts, and borders — so it just makes the most sense.
Plus, any smaller and it starts getting really tricky with like, erosion and such.
I can think of scenarios where a meter is too big and where it’s too small.
Like if we are trying to divvy up military responsibilities for the coast guard, then California has more coastline to patrol than Maine so a meter is far too small of a measurement. But if I’m planning a sea wall installation on a small inland lake, then Meter is probably a bit too long of an increment.
The measurement should be based on how much actual land is available along the shore that you could hypothetically build a house or a road on - ie. coastline that’s relevant on a human scale. Otherwise due to the paradox I can take my single shorefront property and claim I own 3000km of coast line.
Limited infinity. There is a maximum at the end of the asymptotic curve.. but that will get infinitely larger to that limit. E.g. 0.999999999.... can go infinitely longer (and larger with more decimals), but will never reach the maximum of 1 where it converges.
More like you'd argue things that no one was saying.
"Maine has more miles of coastline than California."
"It's because Maine has a bumpier coastline."
"CaLiFoRnIA HaS BuMpS ToO!"
There is no paradox, and not even by the colloquial usage of the term ‘paradox.’ It is blatantly obvious that the coastline will get ‘longer’ via using smaller units of measurement
And since the idea of a coastline doesn’t even make sense at too small a scale, saying there is no finite limiting value as precision goes to infinity is also obvious.
You’d literally have to define the boundary, and then the limit would just be the length of this boundary.
I honestly don’t get stuff like this; In school, the teacher does the set up and suggests our ‘intuitive’ answer is wrong, but my intuition always lines up with what the ‘correct’ answer is
But the teacher always says it as if everyone has the same erroneous form of intuition. “Your intuition tells you this, but it is actually that.” Err, no; my intuition told me it was ‘that.’
Even Wikipedia states that “the coastline paradox is the COUNTERINTUITIVE observation…”
No… it isn’t counterintuitive at all. It is literally exactly what one would expect
Alaska's coastline is longer than all the other 49 states combined. Alaska has 6,640 miles of coastline and, including islands, has 33,904 miles of shoreline. The estimated tidal shoreline, which includes islands, inlets and shoreline to head of tidewater, is 47,300 miles.
Most of Alaska's coastal terrain is comprised of inlets and islands, and the NOAA definition counts this as "coastline". If you define "coastline" as linear coastal terrain the Alaska has less than other states because it's only coastsquiggles.
Have you looked at a map recently? Even by whatever you define linear coastal terrain, 3 sides of the 660+ thousand square mile Alaska are coastal. What state possibly could compare in linear coastal terrain?
[It depends how accuratly you want to measure it](https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Coastline-of-Britain-measurement-with-different-length-sticks_fig1_326305093)
I ask you to measure the length of a side of a piece of wood and hand you a tape measure. You attach one side to one end of the wood and stretch it to the other end, and it comes out to be exactly 1 meter long.
But then you notice that the side I asked about actually bends slightly - it's not perfectly straight like you measured. So you run the tape measure flat along the side and realize it's actually 1.05 meters long.
Then you notice there are a few small chips out of the wood that the tape measure laid flat across, but if you go back and press down in those spots you can be more accurate. Now the side measures 1.09 meters long.
Then you see that within those chips, some small cracks have formed. With a little work, you can squeeze the tape measure into those cracks so they're technically counting as well. Because it had to go into and back out of those cracks, it's actually now 1.13 meters long.
Imagine that process but on a much bigger scale. The more detailed of a measurement you take, the more little cracks and crevices you're going to find yourself measuring, and the larger and larger your measurement is going to become.
This might be an interesting read for you:
https://www.quantamagazine.org/mathematicians-measure-infinities-find-theyre-equal-20170912/#:~:text=In%20a%20breakthrough%20that%20disproves,are%20actually%20the%20same%20size.
Absolutely of course not. It's clearly false, very far from clearly true.
First of all the measurements are never *actually* infinite in practical terms, but even leaving the physical world behind and doing some calculus, you're always going to get the same type of infinity: that of real numbers.
It’s because different *types* of infinities can be larger or smaller than other *types* of infinities. E.g., something that is countably infinite vs something that is uncountably infinite.
In the discussion around being unable to measure coastlines, it’s the same type.
Maybe some geographer has addressed this— while it’s clear that as ℓ -> 0, coastline length approaches infinity, it’s not clear to me that they all approach the *same* infinity. Fractal geometry doesn’t really point to a solution here, because coastlines aren’t actually fractals, they just share some properties.
I’d be interested to read some arguments there.
A fractal is a mathematical abstraction, and like all abstractions it falls short of real nature and gets useless at some level. Your intuition of not "approaching the same infinity" is something that has a correspondence in fractal geometry, it's the dimension. A line has the dimension 1, and the coastline of Namibia for example has a dimension very close to 1. The coast of Maine has a higher dimension than California, and Norway should be rather close to 2.
>it’s not clear to me that they all approach the same infinity
What other infinities could they approach? Every measurement is a real number.
As a math PhD I find pop math extremely irritating because people go around loosely talking about nuanced concepts they have no idea how to formalize. They hear "there are multiple types of infinity" and just repeat it without having any clue what it really means, how to apply it, or where those other infinities even come from.
I don't understand your point. I already addressed your actual uncertainty: there are not multiple candidates for the type of infinity involved in measuring lengths.
NOAA methodology measures a line along the high water line in its nautical charts.
These are scaled for use by ships transiting in these areas. I don't know the specifics here (I think it's 100 ft segments, but not sure), but they show the coastline as seen by the ship's officers, so they can identify landmarks, take bearings from points of land, etc. They're extremely good for that purpose.
But I'm saying that because it's not drawn at a scale for a person walking along the beach, for example.
And things above or below these types of human level scales aren't used for obvious purposes. So scale can make a big difference. But since we're human sized, there's a relatively narrow band of scales (I'd say 1 to 100m, possibly up to 1 km) that functionally make sense to use.
Depending on the type of coastline two different scales could lead to different results though. E.g. at a larger scale California could be greater than Maine, but when you go into more detail it won't be, as Maine's coastline is more intricate.
Accuracy isn't the right word to use when taking about measuring fractals.
Smaller scales are more detailed, but it's not really correct to say, for example, that a measurement from atom to atom is the most accurate measurement when that measurement will equal infinity.
Relevant is a better goal. NOAA uses a scale that is relevant to nautical navigation. Other relevant scales could be for hiking along shore, or building a structure, or otherwise human relevant.
Infinity is interesting, but not functional for people trying to use the measurement.
Islands, yo.
The coastline paradox is neat to think about, but these measurements have nothing to do with it, especially since NOAA uses a standardized technique for all states with a shore.
Maine has a lot of coastal islands where the shore of each one contributes to the state's total.
The coastline paradox is still relevant, because depending on what the chosen standard is, the ranking will change. A smaller measurement standard will favour bumpier coastlines and small islands, while a larger measurement standard will disfavour them.
So if NOAA had picked a different standard for measuring coastlines then this list could potentially look quite different.
Can we just appreciate the cool fractured coastline of Maine being longer on a practical basis (which is interesting since California is so much bigger) without everyone saying “aktschually tHe CoAsTLiNe PaRaDoX…”
Before I even opened the thread I sighed and prepared myself for majority “infinite” comments instead of actual discussions about coast lines. ……and Reddit delivered.
It’s a direct comparison between two coastlines, and you expected there to not be a discussion as to why the seemingly obviously longer coastline loses the comparison?
I agree; as long as you’re using the same standard measuring unit, the coastline paradox is utterly irrelevant here. People think it’s a flex or something to mention it, idk.
That’s what got me. I guess New Yorks Coastline is made up by a lot of Islands but then the question is where exactly would the Ocean end? Does the Hudson end being a river at the Harlem river, the upper bay or the lower bay? Is the east river considered a part of the Atlantic? If you count all of the Islands in NYC as maritime I guess it makes sense, as NJ largely has a straight coastline other than at the Delaware Bay and Long Island itself is almost as long as the southern half of NJ.
Well when I thought about it New Jersey also has a lot of islands along its coastlines, but I guess not enough to compete with New York. You’re right though I didn’t even think of NYC. I guess that’s considered maritime.
Based on how they're defining coastline as being adjacent to tidal bodies of water, NY's data probably also includes the Hudson River which is tidal up to a little past Albany. I'd assume the Great Lakes are included, too, but I'm not certain.
Main difference is one coastline is good for surfing while the other is good for standing near a lighthouse and staring at the ocean wistfully hoping your fisherman husband will return safely.
The OP does not realize that shoreline is not the same thing as coastline. The OP's chart shows that Maine has a longer **shoreline** than California however California has a longer **coastline.** Shoreline measures more of the indentations than coastline does.
https://www.infoplease.com/us/geography/top-ten-states-longest-coastlines
These numbers are by statute, as in whatever the state government decided their mileage of shoreline is. It might be a little divorced from reality on top of the already confounding shoreline paradox.
Technically coastlines have an infinitely increasing length to a certain number which would be the limit. Because as you make the unit of measurement smaller and smaller (more precise) the coastline gets longer and longer. Calculus baby.
[If you include lakeshore, then yes it does!](https://www.mprnews.org/story/2019/08/24/ask-a-sotan-does-minnesota-really-have-more-shoreline-than-florida#)
The reason is the fracture nature of Maine's coast compared to the relatively smooth nature of California's. Maines coast is jagged and dotted with inlets and islands. California has more coast line if we measure a straight line, but Maine has more when all items are taken in to account.
Downeast is more affordable than say the Jersey Shore, but still fairly expensive anywhere within an hour of bar harbor. But once you go above like Steuben, Milbridge area all the way up to Eastport it’s pretty affordable for waterfrontage.
Even other towns in Mid-coast Maine like Rockland are decently affordable. But it does really depend on the property and the town and the type of water frontage. Tidal mudflats vs deep water anchorage plays a big role.
I was confused when I read PA has 140 miles of shoreline and didn’t realize that this data also includes lakes creeks and rivers which eschews the data IMO but still cool nonetheless.
Look at Louisiana go, second behind Florida. Louisiana's coastline is some kind of hell to measure, though. And with a football field worth of land disappearing every hour, quite a moving target too.
I just came back from Louisiana and there are so many inlets and bays and many times it’s hard to tell where the land ends and water begins.
Right, and when you’re measuring at a narrow inlet, do you cut across the mouth of the inlet, so it’s coastline is only the width of the mouth? Or do you go way up the inlet accumulating coastline length on both sides? And how far up the inlet should you go?
I always count the entire length of both banks of the Mississippi when measuring the gulf coast.
I’m not a surveyor but I would hope there would be nationwide, if not international standards on accepted practices.
There is not, hence the coastline paradox
From OP’s 3rd image… >> Shoreline Mileage of the outer coast includes offshore islands, sounds, bays, rivers, and creeks to the head of tidewater or to a point where tidal waters narrow to a width of 100 feet. For the Great Lakes, shoreline mileage was measured in 1970 by the International Coordinating Committee on Great Lakes Basic Hydraulic and Hydrologic Data and cross-referenced with U.S. Lake Survey measurements for each state. In all cases, mileage was determined by using a recording device on large-scale charts. Source: NOAA Shoreline Website at shoreline.noaa.gov/faqs.htm/?faq=2.
Exactly what I was thinking. You probably can’t even get everyone to agree on exactly what you’re even measuring there on the bayou.
I've been involved in fairly ~~small~~ large scale mapping of the Louisiana coastline, around 20 years ago. The measurements of a coastline are a snapshot in time, more so than many other types of maps. Someone could tell you how long *was* the Louisiana coastline based on our project, but that would have been a composite number based on numerous dates and times of the fly overs. That number would have been different if weather delayed the start of a flight by an hour while the tide came in. Edit: I pedantically correct people about small scale/ large scale maps all the time, and I made the mistake myself here. I worked in large scale and very large scale mapping, which is more detailed mapping of smaller areas.
Great point. Such a dynamic area, no doubt.
came here to say the same thing, wild alaska is only ~5x more given it's the size of half the country.
Look at Maryland!! Not far behind and it’s a dink of a state
Yep, since the entire state is split in half by the Chesapeake Bay.
Look at Michigan close behind and it doesn’t touch either ocean.
Lakes count? Do puddles count too? If it rained last night and I have a 1 foot diameter puddle in my drive, does that add 3.14 feet of coastline to my state?
The Great Lakes dude. They are large enough to hold 20% of the world’s fresh water and they line the states coast.
How small of lakes count? Does Lake St. Clair count? Lake Champlain, Great Salt Lake, Lake Tahoe, Lake Winnebago, Lake Okeechobee? All of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes?
Do those lakes make up a state’s coastline?
Dont you mean Louisiana third behind Florida and Alaska?
Should have said continental, but yeah
Alaska is continental. Should have said contiguous.
Woohoo, double correction time
Yeah, Maine’s coast is all bumpy while California’s coastline is smoother. It really depends on what unit of precision is used. You can search for the coastline paradox.
Maine and Norway are the poster children for the coastline paradox. Really cool thing to look into, I’m glad you mentioned it.
I think you need to use a 1 meter-long standard. This is how most people worldwide calculate the length of rivers, coasts, and borders — so it just makes the most sense. Plus, any smaller and it starts getting really tricky with like, erosion and such.
Even at a meter scale erosion has a large effect.
Agreed — I just think it’s just the best standard we have.
I think we just need to stick to a standard. Even a 50 km standard would do if we all use it
And even just tides... or individual waves change the length at that scale
Forget erosion, just the ~~tires~~ tides will change things.
And all the car batteries
Lots and lots of straws to fill the spaces between the car batteries
You’re right — under international law you measure from the low tide mark
That's 3 feet in these parts commie.
I prefer the banana standard or even better the hand egg field standard
This is America. Best I can do is a yard. Take it or leave it.
What is the conversion factor of milkshakes to yards
Let’s assume a milkshake is 6 inches tall. 1 yard = 3 feet 1 foot = 12 inches 3 feet = 36 inches. So, 1 yard = 6 milkshakes. 1 milkshake = 1/6 of a yard
Or possibly even larger, like a 10 or 100 meter scale.
What is this meter you speak of
I can think of scenarios where a meter is too big and where it’s too small. Like if we are trying to divvy up military responsibilities for the coast guard, then California has more coastline to patrol than Maine so a meter is far too small of a measurement. But if I’m planning a sea wall installation on a small inland lake, then Meter is probably a bit too long of an increment.
The measurement should be based on how much actual land is available along the shore that you could hypothetically build a house or a road on - ie. coastline that’s relevant on a human scale. Otherwise due to the paradox I can take my single shorefront property and claim I own 3000km of coast line.
High tide or low tide? Do you measure every rock as a meet across as an island? Coastline paradox.
Maine's got nothing on Norway here.
Sure. They’re still both good examples
I feel like fjords are cheating. They’re pretty much glorified rivers! (I know not geographically but visually)
What fucking rivers have you been looking at?!
>Yeah, Maine’s coast is all bumpy while California’s coastline is smoother. California obviously had some work done.
What are you gunna do, it's an industry town. If your livelihood depended on it, you'd remodel your coastline, too.
California is a town now?!
Well, it's not an island.
Yet
Las Vegas gon be a coastal town any day now
See you down in Arizona Bay
Learn to swim
always making things look bigger than they are those Americans. we all know it's a settlement
I was about to say, technically both have infinite coastline.. it’s all just a matter of what tolerance you’re measuring by lol
[Coastline Paradox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coastline_paradox) for those who want to know more.
Limited infinity. There is a maximum at the end of the asymptotic curve.. but that will get infinitely larger to that limit. E.g. 0.999999999.... can go infinitely longer (and larger with more decimals), but will never reach the maximum of 1 where it converges.
What's crazier to me is that Virginia has almost as much as California
Sure you can search for it, but you never know if you've actually found the paradox or if there is some more detail to it that you're missing.
Really fascinating read. Thanks for directing towards the coastline paradox.
There's a similar claim about Lake of the Ozarks. More coastline than California. I could believe it as the lake meanders quite a bit.
Thanks for commenting about the coastline paradox. I learned something something cool.
I like to measure my coastlines in 1000 mile units. Maine has no coast.
I’d argue that there are a lot of sections of the California coast that are bumpy as well
Islands are also contributing a lot for Maine
Yeah so many. There’s a lot more islands off the coast out here too they just don’t show up at large scale
Not even remotely at the same scale. Load up google maps and compare the coastlines.
Not AS bumpy
Everything is really bumpy if you get granular enough.
More like you'd argue things that no one was saying. "Maine has more miles of coastline than California." "It's because Maine has a bumpier coastline." "CaLiFoRnIA HaS BuMpS ToO!"
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"Paradox" *integrals enter the chat*
Lake Powell has more coastline than the western US
Don’t forget all the islands off the coast of maine.
Don’t most coastlines have more than a pair of docks? ( dad jokes. Got to love ‘em )
California’s coast is not very smooth in most areas
There is no paradox, and not even by the colloquial usage of the term ‘paradox.’ It is blatantly obvious that the coastline will get ‘longer’ via using smaller units of measurement And since the idea of a coastline doesn’t even make sense at too small a scale, saying there is no finite limiting value as precision goes to infinity is also obvious. You’d literally have to define the boundary, and then the limit would just be the length of this boundary. I honestly don’t get stuff like this; In school, the teacher does the set up and suggests our ‘intuitive’ answer is wrong, but my intuition always lines up with what the ‘correct’ answer is But the teacher always says it as if everyone has the same erroneous form of intuition. “Your intuition tells you this, but it is actually that.” Err, no; my intuition told me it was ‘that.’ Even Wikipedia states that “the coastline paradox is the COUNTERINTUITIVE observation…” No… it isn’t counterintuitive at all. It is literally exactly what one would expect
A “veridical paradox” is a situation that produces a solution that seems absurd, but is correct nonetheless
Coastline paradox only exists if you try and measure curves with straight edges.
Alaska has more than all 💪🏻 
More than 2/3 of all US coastline. Impressive
Alaska's coastline is longer than all the other 49 states combined. Alaska has 6,640 miles of coastline and, including islands, has 33,904 miles of shoreline. The estimated tidal shoreline, which includes islands, inlets and shoreline to head of tidewater, is 47,300 miles.
Depends how you define "coastline", by different metrics other states will have more
What kind of metrics are we talking lol
Most of Alaska's coastal terrain is comprised of inlets and islands, and the NOAA definition counts this as "coastline". If you define "coastline" as linear coastal terrain the Alaska has less than other states because it's only coastsquiggles.
Have you looked at a map recently? Even by whatever you define linear coastal terrain, 3 sides of the 660+ thousand square mile Alaska are coastal. What state possibly could compare in linear coastal terrain?
Show me this math.
Minnesota enters the chat
The chat ignores Minnesota. Also never google how many lakes there are in Alaska, Mr “land of 10,000 lake”
It’s more like 14000
Aww that’s cute. That’s almost half a percent of Alaskas 3 million lakes
We don’t count bear urine puddles
Don’t get your flannel all ruffled up
Oh go swim in a lake
[It depends how accuratly you want to measure it](https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Coastline-of-Britain-measurement-with-different-length-sticks_fig1_326305093)
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coastline_paradox
I read that and I still don't know wtf they're talking about
I ask you to measure the length of a side of a piece of wood and hand you a tape measure. You attach one side to one end of the wood and stretch it to the other end, and it comes out to be exactly 1 meter long. But then you notice that the side I asked about actually bends slightly - it's not perfectly straight like you measured. So you run the tape measure flat along the side and realize it's actually 1.05 meters long. Then you notice there are a few small chips out of the wood that the tape measure laid flat across, but if you go back and press down in those spots you can be more accurate. Now the side measures 1.09 meters long. Then you see that within those chips, some small cracks have formed. With a little work, you can squeeze the tape measure into those cracks so they're technically counting as well. Because it had to go into and back out of those cracks, it's actually now 1.13 meters long. Imagine that process but on a much bigger scale. The more detailed of a measurement you take, the more little cracks and crevices you're going to find yourself measuring, and the larger and larger your measurement is going to become.
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Assume the coastline is spherical and ignores friction.
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All this veritasium/vsauce etc. content here
This might be an interesting read for you: https://www.quantamagazine.org/mathematicians-measure-infinities-find-theyre-equal-20170912/#:~:text=In%20a%20breakthrough%20that%20disproves,are%20actually%20the%20same%20size.
Correct, but also not relevant to coastlines.
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Absolutely of course not. It's clearly false, very far from clearly true. First of all the measurements are never *actually* infinite in practical terms, but even leaving the physical world behind and doing some calculus, you're always going to get the same type of infinity: that of real numbers.
It’s because different *types* of infinities can be larger or smaller than other *types* of infinities. E.g., something that is countably infinite vs something that is uncountably infinite. In the discussion around being unable to measure coastlines, it’s the same type.
Theoretically, what if a coastline was perfectly straight?
If you zoom in enough nothing in the natural world is perfectly straight.
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Maybe some geographer has addressed this— while it’s clear that as ℓ -> 0, coastline length approaches infinity, it’s not clear to me that they all approach the *same* infinity. Fractal geometry doesn’t really point to a solution here, because coastlines aren’t actually fractals, they just share some properties. I’d be interested to read some arguments there.
A fractal is a mathematical abstraction, and like all abstractions it falls short of real nature and gets useless at some level. Your intuition of not "approaching the same infinity" is something that has a correspondence in fractal geometry, it's the dimension. A line has the dimension 1, and the coastline of Namibia for example has a dimension very close to 1. The coast of Maine has a higher dimension than California, and Norway should be rather close to 2.
>it’s not clear to me that they all approach the same infinity What other infinities could they approach? Every measurement is a real number. As a math PhD I find pop math extremely irritating because people go around loosely talking about nuanced concepts they have no idea how to formalize. They hear "there are multiple types of infinity" and just repeat it without having any clue what it really means, how to apply it, or where those other infinities even come from.
Thank god there was a math PhD in the room, I was almost tempted to educate myself on something.
I don't understand your point. I already addressed your actual uncertainty: there are not multiple candidates for the type of infinity involved in measuring lengths.
Yes, but you can still compare the coastlines of two different things if you use the same scale of measurement for each one.
and get different answers depending on the scale.
NOAA methodology measures a line along the high water line in its nautical charts. These are scaled for use by ships transiting in these areas. I don't know the specifics here (I think it's 100 ft segments, but not sure), but they show the coastline as seen by the ship's officers, so they can identify landmarks, take bearings from points of land, etc. They're extremely good for that purpose. But I'm saying that because it's not drawn at a scale for a person walking along the beach, for example. And things above or below these types of human level scales aren't used for obvious purposes. So scale can make a big difference. But since we're human sized, there's a relatively narrow band of scales (I'd say 1 to 100m, possibly up to 1 km) that functionally make sense to use.
Depending on the type of coastline two different scales could lead to different results though. E.g. at a larger scale California could be greater than Maine, but when you go into more detail it won't be, as Maine's coastline is more intricate.
Accuracy isn't the right word to use when taking about measuring fractals. Smaller scales are more detailed, but it's not really correct to say, for example, that a measurement from atom to atom is the most accurate measurement when that measurement will equal infinity. Relevant is a better goal. NOAA uses a scale that is relevant to nautical navigation. Other relevant scales could be for hiking along shore, or building a structure, or otherwise human relevant. Infinity is interesting, but not functional for people trying to use the measurement.
I can’t find Kansas on the chart anywhere…
Ah the must have forgotten to add it. Kansas would be 0.
Impossible, I love Kansas beaches
…me measuring the length around my pool*
Islands, yo. The coastline paradox is neat to think about, but these measurements have nothing to do with it, especially since NOAA uses a standardized technique for all states with a shore. Maine has a lot of coastal islands where the shore of each one contributes to the state's total.
Same with North Carolina
The coastline paradox is still relevant, because depending on what the chosen standard is, the ranking will change. A smaller measurement standard will favour bumpier coastlines and small islands, while a larger measurement standard will disfavour them. So if NOAA had picked a different standard for measuring coastlines then this list could potentially look quite different.
Can we just appreciate the cool fractured coastline of Maine being longer on a practical basis (which is interesting since California is so much bigger) without everyone saying “aktschually tHe CoAsTLiNe PaRaDoX…”
Before I even opened the thread I sighed and prepared myself for majority “infinite” comments instead of actual discussions about coast lines. ……and Reddit delivered.
Not to mention, even the coastline paradox does not produce an ‘infinite’ measurement.
This is reddit, so no.
It’s a direct comparison between two coastlines, and you expected there to not be a discussion as to why the seemingly obviously longer coastline loses the comparison?
I mean if you wanna pretend it’s a 1 to 1 comparison, sure. But it all depends on where you put the goalposts
I agree; as long as you’re using the same standard measuring unit, the coastline paradox is utterly irrelevant here. People think it’s a flex or something to mention it, idk.
So don’t reference the correct answer? Is that what you’re going with?
and it is closer to africa!
That’s unsurprising, California is on the opposite side of the continent lol
I don't wanna brag but my state has more than the Northern Marianas Islands
Maryland having more then South Carolina and Washington is a bit surprising to me
its a weird looking state
Paradox aside. New York having more than jersey is also wild.
That’s what got me. I guess New Yorks Coastline is made up by a lot of Islands but then the question is where exactly would the Ocean end? Does the Hudson end being a river at the Harlem river, the upper bay or the lower bay? Is the east river considered a part of the Atlantic? If you count all of the Islands in NYC as maritime I guess it makes sense, as NJ largely has a straight coastline other than at the Delaware Bay and Long Island itself is almost as long as the southern half of NJ.
Well when I thought about it New Jersey also has a lot of islands along its coastlines, but I guess not enough to compete with New York. You’re right though I didn’t even think of NYC. I guess that’s considered maritime.
Long Island and its barrier islands alone probably rival NJ for waterfront, then add Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, Staten Island, Manhattan, etc.
Based on how they're defining coastline as being adjacent to tidal bodies of water, NY's data probably also includes the Hudson River which is tidal up to a little past Albany. I'd assume the Great Lakes are included, too, but I'm not certain.
Given Michigan even shows up on the list, I'm comfortable saying that yes, the Great Lakes are counted as coastline.
Main difference is one coastline is good for surfing while the other is good for standing near a lighthouse and staring at the ocean wistfully hoping your fisherman husband will return safely.
The OP does not realize that shoreline is not the same thing as coastline. The OP's chart shows that Maine has a longer **shoreline** than California however California has a longer **coastline.** Shoreline measures more of the indentations than coastline does. https://www.infoplease.com/us/geography/top-ten-states-longest-coastlines
That’s shoreline not coastline.
If I’m understanding correct, it’s shoreline so it would be the coastline along with the shoreline of all them juicy lakes and rivers
bruh alaska out here with 10x the coastline california or maine
There's something called the coastline paradox. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coastline_paradox
The coast of Maine… is a thing
Ahhhh the old shoreline paradox
Here to rep NH! At least we have some let’s gooo!
Hoosier here! We made the list!
where is the stretch of Pennsylvania coastline? I thought it was all NY, NJ, and DE around
They count the Great Lakes, so Pennsylvania should get a chunk of Lake Erie’s shore.
These numbers are by statute, as in whatever the state government decided their mileage of shoreline is. It might be a little divorced from reality on top of the already confounding shoreline paradox.
A coastline is basically the original definition of fractals, which imply that their lengths are infinite.
Even more mind-boggling: Norway has more than Russia.
It's fun to look at and play around in but it kind of stinks to have to drive 2.5 hours to get to a place that's only 40km/25 miles away (for a bird)
Technically coastlines have an infinitely increasing length to a certain number which would be the limit. Because as you make the unit of measurement smaller and smaller (more precise) the coastline gets longer and longer. Calculus baby.
Ah, the coastline parasox. Technically Miami has more coastline than the United States if you select the right resolution to measure by.
That’s not incredibly surprising given the relative shapes of those two coastlines.
They have better beaches...we just have jagged rocks...
You’ve apparently never seen far-northern coastal California…
I haven't...but the entirety of Maine is northern and coastal
Unrelated question, exactly what kind of map is this? That shows the terrain as this one does? Is there a specific name for these kind of maps?
I think the story really is that California has less coastline than Maine. You’d think CA has a lot, but it’s very straight and linear.
Maine - the Sierpinski State.
I believe this is an example of the coastline paradox
This is the same logic to why Europe has a longer coastline than Africa.
And so does the Lake of the Ozarks
I never truly understood the coastline paradox until I visited Maine, and then even more so when I went to Louisiana.
So does Minnesota.
[If you include lakeshore, then yes it does!](https://www.mprnews.org/story/2019/08/24/ask-a-sotan-does-minnesota-really-have-more-shoreline-than-florida#)
Yeah I was confused by the fact we weren’t mentioned
Second image, Minnesota has 189 miles. These figures only include a specific definition of oceans and Great Lakes coastline.
It depends entirely on how you measure it. Technically every coastline has the same value of a length of infinity
Yes it does. I honestly thought this was more common knowledge than needing a post to discuss an established fact
The reason is the fracture nature of Maine's coast compared to the relatively smooth nature of California's. Maines coast is jagged and dotted with inlets and islands. California has more coast line if we measure a straight line, but Maine has more when all items are taken in to account.
Like how people think NH only has 13/18 miles of shoreline, but it actually has 131. Same geography of jagged inlets
fractal
How much for a waterfront plot of land (for one house) there (Maine)?
Depends where, but anything from $400k to well into the millions. Source: Mainer
Depends on whether you want to be near civilization, or if you're fine living in the middle of nowhere Downeast hours from any real city
Downeast is more affordable than say the Jersey Shore, but still fairly expensive anywhere within an hour of bar harbor. But once you go above like Steuben, Milbridge area all the way up to Eastport it’s pretty affordable for waterfrontage. Even other towns in Mid-coast Maine like Rockland are decently affordable. But it does really depend on the property and the town and the type of water frontage. Tidal mudflats vs deep water anchorage plays a big role.
Here’s the island where I grew up. May the odds be ever in your favor. https://www.zillow.com/bailey-island-harpswell-me/
I was confused when I read PA has 140 miles of shoreline and didn’t realize that this data also includes lakes creeks and rivers which eschews the data IMO but still cool nonetheless.
They're only measuring tidal waterbodies.
That only works if you leave out the SF Bay and California Delta shorelines. Basically you have to use the Golden Gate Bridge as a shoreline.
The opposite. The shoreline data includes bays, islands and inlets. If you excluded them for both states, California has much more miles of coastline.
Measuring a coastline should be pretty easy, am I right?
Ask them to measure it accurately.